Emil met Yabo several years ago on his first semester-long stint in The Gambia. Yabo works for the University and he was assigned to Emil to be his personal driver. This is often what happens when you are a semi-respected guest of any reputable organization. You get your own driver who will take you wherever you need to go. So over the course of the 3-some months that Emil was there he got to know Yabo very well. Yabo has had many jobs over the years, including a few stints as a driver for some of the high-end hotels. Because of this, Yabo has become very enlightened in the ways of the toubabs, and has taken this knowledge and used it. Which makes him a very good driver. He knows that we are time oriented and therefore is never late (in fact he's almost always early). He knows that we like to be happy and unbothered so he's always trying to make sure things are running smoothly and that we aren't being accosted too much by bumsters and merchants. He also knows that we are inquisitive and value honesty so he will give us interesting tid-bits of information and will tell us the truth if we have questions. He also realizes that we like professional people so he always acts in a manner that is befitting his role and responsibilities.
Now let me introduce Al-hajji, AKA Jethro. Jethro was our other driver. Our group was so large that we had to have two small buses to cart us around. Yabo was in charge of the blue bus and Jethro was the driver for the red bus. Prior to this job assignment Yabo had never worked with Jethro. They lived semi-near each other and when Yabo was looking for another driver with a van someone referred him to Al-hajji.
Now a quick little lesson. English is one of the official languages of The Gambia. However, most people, particularly in Banjul speak one or both of the main tribal languages (Mandinka and Wolof). There are two primary purposes of the schooling in The Gambia. One is to learn English, so that people can succeed in the heavily tourism-based economy. Secondly, to learn Arabic, so they can read the Koran (the country is approx. 90% Muslim). So, it was shocking to us on the first day when we realized that Al-hajji did not speak a word of English. Emil said it was the first Gambian he had ever met between the age of 6 and 60 that did not speak English. The only thing we could figure was that Al-hajji had never been to school in his life. Amazing. Apparently it was shocking to Yabo as well. When we told him he was like "What??? No!" but sure enough, he did not. Culturally I thought this was interesting. I'm sure when Yabo approached him they spoke in Mandinka and it never crossed his mind to ask him if he spoke English, because, as I mentioned, EVERYONE speaks English. You would think that in the course of conversation Al-hajji would have mentioned the fact that he didn't speak English since I'm sure Yabo mentioned that he would be working with Americans. BUT, as we came to find out, Al-hajji was not the brightest bulb in the pack anyway, so actually NO that did not occur to him to mention.
Now I could give you about 20 different and equally hilarious Jethro stories, but one day sums up the differences between Yabo and Jethro rather succinctly.
The day back from up-country was a memorable one for sure. The morning started off well. We were all happy to get the hell out of there. The north road of the country was recently paved and made for nice travel. We were happily singing along to Celine Dion (Patron Saint of The Gambia) when everything began to unravel. We were stopped at at check point briefly before moving on. Being in the blue bus I have only heard this story through word of mouth, but it still is a good one. Apparently while going through the checkpoint some guy jumps on the back of the red bus (which happens a lot...there is a ladder and people were always jumping on it to ride with the toubabs) but this guy looked slightly deranged. Emil is of course like "Dude, get off" to which the guy replies "No problem! (Favorite saying of the Gambians) I'm just going right up here." So Emil lets him stay. Well right after the check point Jethro pulls to the side of the road and jumps out. Lack of communication skills leads Emil to believe that he was pulling over so the dude could get off and maybe that Jethro had to pee. To Emil's amazement he walks over to a guy selling a bed and buys it. Now when I say "bed" you have to remember that we are in Africa and it wasn't like he was buying a Sleep Number or something. It was a traditional wood bed made of palm branches and thatched together with twine. He brought it over to the van and deranged man helps him load it up and tie it down securely. The whole time Emil is thinking WTF? At this point we in the blue bus realize that the red bus is no longer behind us and we pull over and wait to see if they appear.
Back at the red bus they have the bed secured and the deranged dude jumps back on. Emil is like "Uh, you said right up here?" And the guys says "Actually, I'm going to Farafenni." Yeah, Farafenni is not "right up here." Farafenni is like 200 km from where we were. So Emil is like "Dude, you can't ride all the way to Farafenni on the back of our bus." And dude is like "No problem!" and somehow Emil signals to Jethro to stop the bus so they can get deranged dude of the bus. Emil and deranged dude are yelling at each other at the back of the bus and Emil keeps firmly pushing deranged dude off the bus and deranged dude keeps jumping back on. They finally think that deranged dude has given up and they begin to drive away when deranged dude runs like mad and jumps on the back of the bus. At this point Emil is getting pissed. And at the same point we in the blue bus are like "Where the hell are they?" and start calling him. I didn't get through to him so Yabo tried, talks to him for a second, hangs up and looks at me and says "He said they are having some problem with a man, but I don't know what he is talking about."
So back at the red bus the students are all getting agitated and start yelling for Emil to kick the ass of deranged dude. Emil has realized that the dude isn't right so he is trying to offer the guy some money so he can catch a bush taxi to Farafenni (which the students did not like...some bleeding hearts they are! They said "You wouldn't give money to someone trying to hijack your car in the US!" They tend to be a little dramatic.). As Emil is trying to reason with the guy he starts running away and Emil thinks "Well at least I got him to get away from us." As he turns back to the car he sees Jethro walking towards the back of the bus holding a tire iron and looking menacing. So much for being big and scary Emil. Sad note: as they were pulling away they saw deranged man sitting on the side of the road sobbing. Seriously, not right.
When they catch up next to us I wish you could have seen Yabo's face. He looks up at the bed and is like "WHAT THE HELL IS THAT???" Then he sighs loudly and on we go.
As we get near the ferry we get stopped at another police check point. The lady was being a royal pain in the ass and was checking every last inch of Yabo's licence and insurance. She then walked around the car checking it out. Then she asks for his fire extinguisher. Sidenote: there are only two seat belts in the entire van but god forbid we don't have a fire extinguisher. Seriously? So dumb. So she is inspecting the fire extinguisher and literally bends the cap back so hard that we hear a loud popping sound. She totally broke the fire extinguisher. And NO JOKE, she looks up and says "Your fire extinguisher is broken." I think if we hadn't been there Yabo would have slapped her. Instead he says "YOU JUST BROKE IT. We all saw and HEARD it." And she says "Oh, well you should replace it. Move along." As we were driving away he says "Lindsay, I promise you, if you guys were not in the car I would have stopped and quarreled very fiercely with that woman." Which is the difference between Yabo and Jethro. Jethro bought a freaking bed while with the toubabs. Yabo sucked it up when he had an actual grievance when he was with the toubabs.
Like I said, there were many other stories that I could have told but I thought this one was both hilarious and a perfect illustration of the differences between them.
Yabo and I with the blue bus
Al-hajji/Jethro with the red bus
And of course, I couldn't leave you without a picture of the bed on the bus. Beverly Hillbillies was complete.
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